The One Who Devours Souls arrives in the bleak, gray hours of the morning, when all good men lie afearing their beds. He (for it is a he, though the strange raiments it wears, and the viscous fluids in its hair make its sex vague) steps from his carriage, a cursed device made for kings in distant lands and bought by the persecution of righteous men, and walks, measured and even as old age, to the threshold, where he strikes the door but thrice. He calls my name, and chills run down my spine, as though death itself were upon me. Death would, in fact, be a blessing, compared to the torment this creature intends for me.